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2011 Australian Grand Prix Qualifying Summary
Vettel is the Clear Qualifying Champ Earlier today, Sebastian Vettel, once again, proved himself and the Red Bull team to be supreme in qualifying, following last years domination. Pre-season Red Bull's only slight competition was the new Ferrari car, that proved to be quite close to the Red Bull's times, by Red Bull standards anyway. Today the team once again delivered and put in fast times throughout the qualifying session, especially Vettel. In Q1 he was only a tenth faster than McLaren's Lewis Hamilton, but that was all just about to change. In Q2, Vettel's lead was extended to 5 tenths over the next fastest car, almost a repeat performance of the previous season. Q3 only got better when straight off the German set a blistering time, that ended up being 8 tenths quicker than what anybody else could manage. Vettel, remains the all time great of qualifying. Disappointment for Barrichello and Heidfeld 2011 Australian qualifying was a bitter disappointment for experienced drivers, Rubens Barrichello and Nick Heidfeld, who is replacing injured driver Robert Kubica, for probably most, or all of the season. Barrichello, who drives for Williams, a pretty decent team, only just managed to scrape 17th position to move forward into Q2, where with almost 20 years of Formula 1 experience and 303 starts, he managed a dreary 17th, following a complete schoolboy error of just drifting onto the edge of the grass when he was coming up to turn 3. This caused him to spin violently and roll backwards into the gravel trap, where he remained, unable to drag his car back out. Heidfeld, on the other hand, made no mistakes but was just very far off the pace in his Renault, a car which has been proven through the driving talent of Kubica, to be an extremely competitive car. As he has not competed in a full season for quite some time now, he did compete in a few of the last races in the 2010 season. He, like Rubens, also has a very long history of Formula 1 but somehow managed to fall short of expectations today. McLaren Make a Surprise Comeback At the pre-season testing in Valencia, Jerez and Barcelona McLaren suffered from a poor reliablitlity car, as well as 10th or so being the best result they could manage to get. The problem boiled mainly down to a new, complicated device near the rear wing at the back of the car, that had obviously failed and/or wasn't working properly. So the team decided to persist and try to get the rear device to work, but to no avail. So coming into the Australian Grand Prix, first race of the season, they looked very weak, and even when they decided to swap the complicated system for the older, simpler and proven system they still were expected to fit in behind the rest of the front runners, due to no testing with the old system on the new car. When the day came, and it was time for qualifying, the car was performing so well that Hamilton managed to sneak in behind major rival Sebastian Vettel, to take 2nd, and Button was just behind Vettel's teammate, Webber to take 4th. This shocked everyone, including McLaren and their team principal Martin Whitmarsh. Hamilton says that, "I can win the race." and that he will give pole sitter Sebastian Vettel, "the race of his life." Ferrari Losing Their Pace Today Ferrari, just couldn't repeat the success that they had been having at the end of last year's season, and in the Spanish testing just a few weeks prior to the qualifying today. They even were doing alright in the practice sessions on Thursday and Friday, but felt that today the car, just wasn't up to scratch. They have said that they look to keep their heads down, and play a safe race tommorrow, hoping that they can get a decent result. When most of the normal changes come, when the teams switch over to the european races, Ferrari hope to gain a lot of headway, and get back in the competitive game, as well as adding a few minor modifications before the next race in China in a fortnights time. Midfield Trio for the Rookies Sauber, Force India and Williams have not only be designing their new car over the Christmas Formula 1 Break, but they have also been appointing new drivers. In partiular for these three teams, they have been signing complete rookies, in the form of Sergio Perez, who is now driving for Sauber, new brit Paul di Resta who has taken a contract with Force India, and Pastor Maldonado, a Venuzuelan who has been doing very well in GP2 has gone to long term team Williams. Earlier, in the qualifying at the Australian Grand Prix, all three rookie drivers proved that they definitely have a future in the highly competitive world of Formula 1. Perez lead the way at the middle of the field, in 13th, followed 6 tenths behind Force India driver Paul di Resta. Finally only 5 thousands of a second behind di Resta was Maldonado. Petrov Steps it Up a Notch With No.1 driver, Robert Kubica seriously injured in a racing accident, and currently undergoing surgery to his hand, Petrov needed to step it up this season, so that Renault still had a chance of holding onto the spot just behind the front runners. And step it up he did, with an amazing 6th position in qualifying today, out qualifying some big names such as Rosberg, Massa and Schumacher. Maybe, in the upcoming seasons he could either take Renault to the title, or move up into the ranks of the title championship taking teams. Whatever happens it can only be a matter of times before he starts winning races, and maybe the World Championship Title? No K.E.R.S Equals a Top Three Starting Position This year sees the return of K.E.R.S (Kinetic Energy Recovery Systems) which allows the driver to give his car a boost of energy, 80bhp to be precise, which will increase the top speed of the car by around 8kph. This should help with overtaking and inqualifying should decrease lap times by around 0.3 seconds. So, maybe the drivers aren't used to K.E.R.S or maybe they just don't get on with it as Vettel, Hamilton and Webber all didn't use the system on their Q3 hot laps. The reason for this in the Red Bull's is because they feel that the new system would interfere with their car in qualifying so have only opted to use it in the race. And Hamilton's reason for not using the K.E.R.S button is because it wasn't working on the car. So maybe the system is just overcomplicating F1 making the drivers think more about when to use it rather than concentrating on the lap, Red Bull certainly think so, and as a result of this it will decrease the lap times slightly. We will only find out as the season progresses. 2 Systems Make Their Way to Formula 1 First up is the new D.R.S system, or Drag Reduction System. To be able to have this system the rear wings now have two parts, the top moving part, and the still lower part. The Drag Reduction System is a new system that has been incorporated into Formula 1 for a couple of really good reasons. The reasons are that last season it was 248 laps before we saw a chapionship, wheel to wheel battle on the race track and the fans wanted more overtaking and excitement. The second reason is that it will decrease lap times by making the cars go up to 12kph quicker in a straight line. The system can cause problems though, as well demonstrated by Adrian Sutil, in his Force India, where he opened up the D.R.S, making a letterbox shaped slot in the rear wing, too early coming onto the pit straight, losing downforce and spinning wildly. He was lucky not to hit the wall with serious consequences. The second system is returing to F1 afteer a 1 year break, and that is the K.E.R.S button, which allows the driver to boost their top speed by up to 8kph by adding an extra 80bhp to the already monstrously powerful cars. This system relies on the energy that is lost when the driver brakes. The system takes the electrical ebergy, and on the push of a button turns it into kinetic energy, giving the driver a boost for up to 6.67 seconds per lap. This system is also hoping to greatly aid the overtaking in Formula 1, as well as reducing lap times by around 0.3 seconds. Category:Seasons Category:2010-19 Seasons Category:2011 Season